The Land They Possessed

By: Mary Worthy Breneman

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Synopsis: "The Wards were moving again. West, of course. Father always went west. As they stood on the carriage block in front of the Ipswich Hotel and the stable hand brought around the team, nine-year-old Michal tried to be calm and grown up." So begins this story of the Ward Family's move to a new life near Eureka, Dakota Territory, in 1885. The novel traces the years from 1885 to 1894 and the settlement of the Eureka area by Germans from Russia. It centers on the American-born Michal Ward, who views the Germans from Russia as outsiders. Mary Worthy Breneman is a pseudonym for co-authors Mary Worthy Thurston and her daughter Muriel Breneman. The Land They Possessed was first published by Macmillan in 1956 and was favorably reviewed in newspapers and other periodicals. The Denver Post reviewer called it "one of the best fictional treats of the year." Muriel Breneman, who now lives in Washington, D.C., says that the story reflects her mother's early years in Eureka and her interest in why the Germans from Russia stayed in the area while others moved on. Her account of her grandfather--the John Ward of the novel-- and his family is a counterpoint to that of the immigrant Gross family and other Germans from Russia. The Wards were transients; the Grosses were the real settlers. Mrs. Breneman believes that Germans from Russia, with their tenacity and their capacity for hard, grueling work, possessed not only the land, but also values worth preserving.